CHS boys golf team struggles in Delta

After a second place finish last week at their home region match, the Carbon High boys golf team encountered some struggles during a region match in Delta.

Carbon High traveled to Delta on Wednesday Aug. 29 to compete in their fourth region match of the season. Unfortunately they did not play as well there as they did the previous week at home and finished in fourth place.

"The team really struggles here," said head coach Tom King. "They just have it in their heads that they can not play well here. If you do not hit it fairly straight off of the tee the course can play difficult, but I know our kids can play better then they did there if they could get their minds in the right place."

Spanish Fork once again won the region match shooting a 319. Payson finished in second with 329 followed by North Sanpete (335), Carbon (345), Delta (347) and Juab (349).

Last year Carbon High shot a 363 and King said the goal this week was to shot a 320.

"I told the kids 320 would be really good at this course, but we were not able to do that," he said. "It was encouraging to see us improve from last year."

As for the team play at the region meet, King praised the play of Dillen Ward and Freston Smith, who played fairly well. Ward bogied his last hole as he was trying to make a birdie to shoot in the 70s, but he finished with an 81. Smith was playing great for 14 straight holes and was only seven over par through 14 holes. He struggled on his last four holes to shot an 86.

Nick Rukavina shot an 84 but the team was not able to count his score this week because King did not let him play varsity this week due to some disciplinary reasons. Robbi Etzel and Dallas Anselmo both shot 89, Blake Bean with 90 and Kody Henrie shot a 101. Waylon Davis also played as a junior varisty player.

With the fourth place finish Carbon High is still in second place overall for the region with only a seven shot lead over third place Payson. Carbon has a 17 shot lead over fourth place N. Sanpete and a 37 shot lead over fifth place Juab.

"Our main purpose is to finish in the top four and make state as a team, but it sure would be nice to finish second this year in the region especially after finishing sixth or last during last season," King explained.

The team will travel to Spanish Fork on Thursday Sept. 6 for their next region match.